Summon Your Hero
by Light1
Summary: Time for Aziraphale to rescue Crowley.


**Summon Your Hero**

Disclaimer: Good Omens belongs to people who are not me.

Rating: PG-13

Authoress note: Time for Aziraphale to rescue Crowley.

Aziraphale had thought Crowley was teasing him when he said summoning was real.

No one really summoned demons, especially in this day and age when belief in such things was rather thin on the ground.

"It's nonsense," Aziraphale said, refilling their wineglasses. "You must think me a fool if you think I'll fall for that."

"It's not nonsense, angel," Crowley snorted. "It's bloody terrible. Can you imagine just going about your business, not bothering a soul," Aziraphale gave a snort of derision at that comment. "Not bothering a soul," Crowley repeated. "Then out of nowhere an invisible, immovable hand grabs you and pulls you into darkness. You open your eyes to find yourself in some wannabe wizards' basement."

"It sounds inconvenient," Aziraphale admitted.

"Inconvenient! Inconvenient isn't the half of it." Crowley rose to his feet, pacing in his irritation. His wine sloshed dangerously in his glass.

"Surely it doesn't happen anymore?" Aziraphale attempted to sooth the irritable demon. "No one really believes in us as real physical beings that can be summoned anymore, besides no one would be powerful enough." The attempt at flattery went unnoticed.

"It happens more than you'd think, and more recently too. I was last summoned in the '80s when I was in the bath!" Crowley collapsed stylishly onto the arm of Aziraphale's armchair, leaning back and to the side, pressing against the angel's shoulder. "Can you imagine, poor me, there I was enjoying a warm soak and sudden poof, my backside was on a cold, hard basement floor."

"That sounds like you," Aziraphale chuckled.

"Oi!" Crowley muttered indignantly.

"Well it does, I doubt the like of Hastur ever turned up naked and covered in bubbles when summoned," Aziraphale said.

"Of course not, Hastur wouldn't be caught bathing if Satan himself ordered him to," Crowley gave a shiver of revulsion.

"I bet the wizards were unimpressed," Aziraphale said.

"Oh no," Crowley said, grinning. "They were all pretty impressed." His eyebrows wiggled suggestively. Aziraphale snorted and pushed him off the arm of the chair. Crowley landed on the floor with a thump and a brief protest about his bruised. Backside. Conversation had changed after that, with Aziraphale giving the matter little to no thought until Crowley didn't visit for days.

Since the not-apocalypse Crowley had practically moved into the bookshop and his chatter about getting a cottage in the South downs was temping Aziraphale. But he had kept his apartment and returned there sporadically. He never stayed away long though, rarely longer than a few hours since Aziraphale had miracle a bed in the upstairs flat for him. Mostly he just popped home to yell at the plants.

So, when Crowley went home one morning and didn't return by the evening, Aziraphale phoned him. There was no answer. Aziraphale had mumbled excuses to himself, that Crowley had fallen into a longer than planned nap and he was being silly getting worried. Crowley would be back in the morning.

But Crowley did not come back in the morning or the next morning, and by that point, Aziraphale was frantic. He walked over to Crowley's apartment, forcing himself not to run. He ran on up the stairs however and dropped his key several times in his haste to get the door open. The feeling that something was wrong had been growing stronger and stronger until by the time Aziraphale forced his key into Crowley's lock, it overcame him with it.

The apartment was empty.

The plants were dead.

"Oh no," Aziraphale whispered, surveying the scene before him.

He'd been so sure Crowley had been teasing him, so sure. No one summoned demons, at least not these days when belief in such things was thin on the ground. These days people were more likely to think demons were metaphors than actual creatures capable of being called upon. Except that someone obviously had had enough belief, the scorched floor, the stink of hellfire and the dead plants, killed in the explosive amount of energy it would take to summon a creature like Crowley, were a testament to the fact that someone believed enough. Aziraphale went to his knees and touched the pattern of scorch marks on the floor. He didn't recognise it beyond it being obviously demonic. He knew enough to recognise what had probably happened, but he knew nothing else.

Aziraphale stood up, squashing the panic that was growing in his gut. He could fix this, he knew he could; he was an angel, for crying out loud. He could fix something like these, surely. He just needed to know more. A voice, suspiciously like Crowley's popped into his head sounding exasperated, "You own a bookshop you dolt, go find out more if you need more information!" Aziraphale nodded, agreeing with the voice and pointedly ignoring the fact that he was imagining voices and they were shouting at him and calling him names. He turned, leaving the devastation behind him, and went home.

The bookshop boasted a remarkable collection regarding theology, including the more esoteric uses of the creatures named. Aziraphale could find several books regarding summoning and after two straight days of reading, he understood how to summon and bind not only demons but many creatures, including some of his fellow angels. Not that he'd want any of them in his bookshop ever again. The thought alone made him shiver.

It was harder to reverse engineer a demonic summoning, and in one attempt Aziraphale accidentally ended up with a furious, tiny demon in his bookshop. He banished it almost immediately, but while the experience hadn't been intentional it had been educational, at least. He now knew that once summoned the circle would contain the demon, stopping it from tearing you limb from limb or just buggering off. The summoning was also a prison. Which meant that Crowley was being held somewhere. Whoever had summoned him hadn't seen fit to release him yet.

The books also elaborated on what a summoner and subsequently trapped demon could be used for, most of it was typical demonic miracle stuff that he'd seen Crowley do a thousand times, but some of it was rather unpleasant and Crowley being trapped and used as a battery, amongst other things, was enough to have Aziraphale grabbing his coat and marching towards the door, ready rain down holy fire on those responsible. It wasn't until his hand touched the door handle that he remembered he had no idea where to go.

He had discovered that summoning's were not restricted by location, Crowley could be anywhere on the planet, which while useful was not good news. He had been trying to reverse engineer the act of summoning, to find something he could trace.

Marching back to his desk, Aziraphale sat down and reread his notes. Those summoning had to bind Crowley and to do that they had to have something of him, the only way to affect a powerful binding was to create a link between the bound and the binder. Most rituals did this via the blood of the human sorcerer and something to represent the demon, usually something connected to the demon's true nature. So, to summon a lust demon you'd use something to entice, like perfume or alcohol, they might summon a demon of wrath with a weapon. Aziraphale had no bloody idea what they had used to summon Crowley. But all the books talk of creating a link had given him an idea, he could create a link to Crowley himself and use that to find him. Aziraphale checked and re-checked his notes before putting a bag together and heading back to Crowley's apartment.

The apartment was cold and silent; it felt dead without Crowley and his plants. Not that it had ever felt alive before, Aziraphale had noticed that on his first visit, that the apartment was more like a hotel or an office with a bed. But now it felt devoid of anything even close to warmth. No wonder Crowley liked the bookshop so much. Aziraphale headed back into the 'secret' room with the plants, or rather what was left of the plants which wasn't a lot, Crowley was going to be so upset when Aziraphale got him back.

Aziraphale knelt in the ash that remained from the summoning and sunk his hands into it, covering them with the remnants of the power that had hooked his best friend and dragged him off to god knows where. He reached into his pocket and took hold of the pair of Crowley's glasses, pulling the ridiculous things out and holding them until Aziraphale realised just how much he disliked them. He'd always been fond of Crowley's eyes, even when he'd been deep in his denial about his softer feelings towards the demon. But regardless of his personal feelings these glasses were a part of Crowley and had been for centuries, they were a perfect item to build a link.

Aziraphale wasn't trying to summon Crowley, so the process was a little different, he had to build a pathway to Crowley, like slinging a lasso out and trying to snag the demon. He used his angelic essence as the rope and the ash, remnants of the previous summoning magic, Crowley's glasses and his intent to guide his 'rope'. His first attempt failed, his rope disintegrating before it had so much as caught a whiff of the demon. But with a slight change of focus, he could locate a thread of the power that had been used to summon his friend. He grabbed it tight and pulled. The power held, and with an effort of will, he sent his own power hurtling down until it hit a wall. He jerked hard, falling backwards when his power hit the wall. He hadn't expected something so strong to block him. But despite the shock, he kept his hold, his focus on the thread, on Crowley. Changing his approach, he sent out tendrils of power along the 'wall' searching for cracks. This was the same road Crowley had been pulled down, Crowley would not have gone easily, even if taken by surprise, he'd have hit the wall and left cracks. Aziraphale just had to find one of those cracks and slip through. He was sweating and breathing hard by the time he found a small crack in the 'wall'. Exhausted, he slipped his power through and bloomed with pride when his tendril of power touched Crowley.

He'd only ever felt Crowley's 'power' once before, when they'd swapped bodies, remnants of Crowley's power had lingered in the body he usually wore. It was red, unsurprisingly, with flecks of black running through it. It had put Aziraphale in mind of Crowley's serpent form. Feeling his strength starting to wane, Aziraphale wrapped his power around Crowley and bound it. He felt Crowley's surprise through the link he was creating, the sudden shock of the connection causing panic in his demonic friend. But the panic was short lived, Crowley recognised him in moments, and it replaced panic with fierce joy. Aziraphale smiled wide and relaxed, letting the connection drop off but leaving a tread between them. A thread he could follow to Crowley.

Following the thread proved difficult. His own inexperience, the stress and worry of losing Crowley, his exhaustion and the newness of the connection between them all mixed to make concentrating on the thread bloody difficult. Also, Aziraphale quickly discovered that while he knew what direction Crowley was in, he had no idea of how far away he was. He could be around the corner or he could be in America. Realising that, Aziraphale decided against taking a taxi and started walking but after half an hour decided this was also ridiculous, if Crowley was across a bloody ocean walking was going to take forever. So, he did something he hadn't had to do since the not-apocalypse. He unveiled his wings. Fortunately, it was late evening, and no one looks up anymore, so no one noticed Aziraphale, who was very much out of practice with flying.

Fortunately, Aziraphale did not have to go far, Crowley's thread pulled him down after a little over an hour and Aziraphale found himself crash landing in a graveyard in a small west country village. The graveyard was poorly lit, and Aziraphale had to hope that none of the wizards had seen him and his undignified landing. His wings were an utter mess, feathers sticking out in all directions, with bits of bush and tree digging in amongst the feathers most uncomfortably. But he didn't have time to fuss as the moment he regained his feet he heard Crowley scream.

The sound made everything in the angel run cold and tight. His head swam for a moment before he controlled himself. Bile rose in his throat as the cry continued, quieting down till it was little more than a whimper. Aziraphale took a deep breath through his nose, feeling a wave of very un-angelic anger bubbling in his gut. Some ridiculous cult had summoned his demon and was making him make those kinds of sounds. They dared to do that to his demon! To Crowley, whose most demonic attribute was a tendency to ask too many inane questions and make smart ass remarks, and these wizards thought they could hurt him!

"Fuck that," Aziraphale muttered under his breath before striding forward ready to rain down holy fire and turn every one of them into salt.

The screaming came again, this time accompanied by laughter, Aziraphale wished he had his sword.

That night six teenagers got to witness the sight of an avenging angel descending upon them with all the fury of heaven and a little of hell mixed in for good measure.

It was only a spark of luck and good fortune that prevented them all from becoming victims of holy fire, or Aziraphale's misfortune depending on how you wanted to look at it. The graveyard was very dark and Aziraphale was furious. He was not paying attention and, in his advance, he did not see the rather large open grave directly between him and the teenagers. His furious advance was rather abruptly halted by his sudden descent into the earth by eight feet.

"Angel?" Crowley said as the still utterly furious, Aziraphale hoisted himself to his feet and stared up at the edge of the grave.

"Crowley," Aziraphale called. "Don't worry, I'll get you!" he jumped, fingertips scraping the top of the open grave. The earth crumbled, and he fell back. The space was too small for him to extend his still ruffled and damaged wings, but he would not let that stop him. He was a bloody angel. An enormous hole in the ground would not stop him.

"Ethan," Crowley's calm voice continued. "Would you give him a hand?"

"Really?" a strange voice called a young strange voice. "Um, he looked mad."

"Get him out of the hole!" Crowley snapped. Aziraphale blinked as a flashlight was shone down into the grave and a thin trembling hand was offered to him.

"Um… here to help you, sir," the quivering voice of Ethan called from behind the blinding light. Aziraphale hesitated only a moment before accepting the help. Once outside of the hole he took stock of his surroundings, there was a small fire. Six scrawny teenagers all clad in black, with far too much eye and lip makeup and perched on top of a standing stone casket was Crowley.

"Crowley," Aziraphale ignored the children for the moment and stumbled forward. "You're ok." Aziraphale's advance was once again cut short, this time by a non-visible barrier surrounding the grave Crowley was perched on. Aziraphale banged on it with his closed fists, feeling his anger rising again. Crowley hopped off the stone and came to the edge of what Aziraphale could now see was a burnt in summoning circle. He put his hand against the barrier where Aziraphale's fist was.

"Hey Angel," he smiled. "Nice to see you." A giggle erupted out of Aziraphale abruptly and his legs, which were already struggling under the strain of the night, two crash landings and his ebbing anger, shook. "Maybe you should sit down," Crowley said as Aziraphale folded in on himself, leaning heavily against the barrier.

"Seems like a good idea," he said, suddenly aware of the eyes on him. He turned to look at the bedraggled teens and glared. "No, someone better tell me what is going on right now or so help me…"

"Calm down, angel," Crowley said. "Everything is fine… well sort of fine, not really, but no one's hurt."

"Um…" a boy said, stepping forward. "We sort of accidentally summoned him."

"Bullshit," another of the teens said, a girl this time. "We fucked it up happened." She turned to face Aziraphale. "We were trying to summon Satan, the great tempter, but ended up with…" she gestured at Crowley.

"They were trying to get the big boss man," Crowley said. "But…" he nudged a bag of apples in the circle with him. "they used the wrong connection."

"They thought Satan tempted Eve in the garden," Aziraphale understood now.

"They were disappointed," Crowley sighed.

"Hey snake dude," one of the other boys stepped forward, still giving Aziraphale a wide birth. "Don't feel bad, your still cool." Crowley smiled at Aziraphale.

"Kids think I'm cool," he stage whispered.

"But…" Aziraphale swallowed the lump in his throat. "Why were you screaming? Why didn't they let you go?"

"Oh that," Crowley blushed. "Well, they've been getting their money's worth."

"He tells us stories," another girl said. "He acts them out."

"While some of us try to fix the damned circle," Ethan snapped.

"Yeah," Crowley muttered. "Being stuck here is boring."

"You're stuck," Aziraphale said.

"Hey to be fair we thought we'd be holding Satan, we weren't worried about letting him go, we were trying to figure out how to hold him as long as we could," the first girl snapped.

"Teenagers tried to summon Satan," Aziraphale breathed. "That's ridiculous."

"I agree," Crowley said. "except that they are apparently well-read teenagers with a fair amount of natural talent amongst the group." He let out a deep sigh. "Shame they weren't as driven about figuring out the banishment part."

"They can't let you go," Aziraphale muttered. "Seriously!"

"They've been trying for about three days," Crowley admitted.

"And now there's a demon outside of the circle," the angry girl snapped. "We are so screwed."

"Excuse me," Aziraphale snapped. "I am an angel."

"Really?" Ethan said. "but you were all fire and brimstone a moment ago."

"Holy fire," Aziraphale corrected.

"You expect me to believe an angel come to… what gets him while we had him trapped?" the angry girl said, her tone now more curious than angry. Aziraphale fidgeted for a moment.

"I wasn't coming to hurt him, I was coming to… to save him," Aziraphale said. Crowley's smile widened to a full grin. He perched back on his gravestone, looking like a cat with cream.

"An angel saving a demon," the girl said, then shrugged. Aziraphale watched the teens for a moment longer before putting his hand to the circle burnt into the ground, a minor effort of angelic energy and the binding circle shattered like thin glass.

"My hero," Crowley hopped down from the stone again and walked to Aziraphale grinning. He stopped in front of him for a moment before pulling him into a hug. Aziraphale froze for half a second before wrapping his arms tightly around Crowley's shoulders and clinging. His wings closing over them.

"Aww," one boy said. "Sweet."

"Gag," the angry girl said. "at least we can get back to what we were trying to do though." At her words, Crowley pushed gently back from Aziraphale.

"Look, it's not cool to do what you want to do, the boss man's not one to mess around with, he will not be half as cool as me."

"He'll be a proper demon, not one who makes stupid jokes and movie references! He'll have actual power." Crowley tensed beside Aziraphale before turning and giving him a firm look.

"You're aware of the tricky nature of demons?" Crowley said, his tone smooth as silk. "You're aware that your circle kept me at bay? But I am out of the circle now."

"You're saying you tricked us into letting you out? But we didn't let you out, he did," the girl yelled.

"But you let him do it," Crowley's shape was becoming indistinct in the darkness and firelight. Aziraphale took a step backwards, giving him some room.

Aziraphale had seen Crowley's snake form many times in the past, it was always oversized, but this attempt was ridiculous. The snake rose from the shadows, and up and up and until with was the size of a dragon. Scaled the size of dinner plate glistened in the firelight and Aziraphale had to clench his fist to stop himself from reaching out to touch. His petting Crowley would ruin the image his friend was going for. The giant snake hissed, the sound setting off distant car alarms and revelling teeth like spears. There was a distinct aroma of ammonia from the teens before they turned and fled. The angry girl was the last to run, but a little encouragement from Crowley in the form of moving slightly towards her was enough to send her bolting.

"I doubt they'll try another summoning," Aziraphale said as giant Snake Crowley lowered his head and rubbed his oversized nose again Aziraphale's belly. "Well done, love." The snake shimmered in shadow and within moments Crowley was back to his normal self.

"Thank you for coming to rescue me," he said, winding thin arms around Aziraphale again.

"Bout time I returned the favour," Aziraphale said into the material of Crowley's shoulder.

**End**

Thank you for reading, please review, I'd love to hear what you think of the fic.

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